A/HRC/18/2 water and sanitation by all appropriate means, including particularly the adoption of legislative measures in the implementation of their human rights obligations; 6. Also reaffirms the important role that national plans of action can play as tools for the promotion and protection of human rights, as highlighted in the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, adopted by the World Conference on Human Rights on 25 June 1993, including for the promotion and protection of the human right to safe drinking water and sanitation; 7. Calls upon States: (a) To continuously monitor and regularly analyse the status of the realization of the right to safe drinking water and sanitation on the basis of the criteria of availability, quality, acceptability, accessibility and affordability; (b) To assess existing policies, programmes and activities in the sectors of water and sanitation, giving due consideration to waste-water management, including treatment and reuse, and to monitor resources allocated to increase adequate access, as well as to identify actors and their capacity; (c) To develop comprehensive plans and strategies, including the definition of responsibilities for all water and sanitation sector actors, to achieve progressively the full realization of the right to safe drinking water and sanitation for all, or re-examine and revise them where necessary to ensure consistency with human rights standards and principles; (d) To assess whether the existing legislative and policy framework is in line with the right to safe drinking water and sanitation, and to repeal, amend or adapt it in order to meet human rights standards and principles; (e) To ensure full transparency of the monitoring and assessment of the implementation of plans of action, projects and programmes in the sectors of water and sanitation and to ensure, including in the planning process, the free, effective, meaningful and non-discriminatory participation of all people and communities concerned, particularly people living in disadvantaged, marginalized and vulnerable situations; (f) To set access targets to be reached in short-time periods for universal service provision, giving priority to realizing a basic level of service for everyone before improving service levels for those already served; (g) To set indicators, including disaggregated data, based on human rights criteria,3 to monitor progress and to identify shortcomings to be rectified and challenges to be met; (h) To ensure financing to the maximum of available resources in order to implement all the necessary measures to ensure that water and sanitation systems are sustainable and that services are affordable for everyone, while ensuring that allocated resources are not limited to infrastructure but also include resources for regulatory activities, operation and maintenance, the institutional and managerial structure and structural measures, including increasing capacity; (i) To provide for a regulatory framework aimed at ensuring that all water and sanitation service providers respect and protect human rights and do not cause human rights violations or abuses, and to ensure that national minimum standards, based on human rights criteria, are in place when water and sanitation services are decentralized, in order to ensure coherence and countrywide compliance with human rights; 3 8 See A/65/254, paras. 22–48 and 53–60. GE.12-17756